Socially Inept
by Cindylou30
Summary: Inspired from Control-Alt-Delete, Tony meets Rhodey for the first time, set seven years ago. Enjoy! :


_A/N I finally saw Control-Alt-Delete, and there was this one line where Tony said his best friend when he was a kid was a talking robot his dad had built for him, so I figured that was before he was friends with Rhodey. Thus, this one-shot was typed! I haven't felt like much of a writer lately, for various reasons, so this is a small attempt to pull myself out of my funk I'm in before I update Pieces of a Whole. I hope you enjoy! (PS, the father-son relationship may seem OOC, but that would be because we only saw them interact with each other in the first few minutes of the first episode, and then, you know, BOOM! So…yup.) ENJOY! XD_

"Dad, I'm serious!" Tony called, walking into the living room and spreading his arms for emphasis, "I'm beginning to think I'm really socially inept."

"And what makes you say that?" Howard asked as he pulled out his phone and began texting one of his employees about a meeting that Friday.

"Well, for one, I'm ten years old and my best friend is a talking robot you built for me." Tony gestured to a small white rectangular object that would move around on its wheels and twitch every once in a while. "I would even creep myself out talking to a robot every day, much less any other kid who's ever met me."

"Well, you are very creepy," the robot squawked from the oak table.

"Hey, shut it before I remove your AI chip!" Tony barked, pointing threateningly at the robot. Then he realized he was talking to the robot again and he dropped his arms limply to his sides, turning back to his father. "See? See what I mean?" Howard only laughed, so Tony plowed on, "Plus, other kids never get me. They think I'm some sort of freak."

"I'm sure they don't think that," Howard reassured, only to have Tony nod enthusiastically, his electric blue eyes, shocking in resemblance to Howard's own, wide.

"Yes they do, they told me! Remember that girl, what was her name? Anyway, she told me I was a freaky weird-looking computer with legs!"

"Well that's not right," Howard smirked. "If you take after me, you certainly can't be weird-looking."

"Da-ad," Tony groaned, shaking his head.

"Look, my friend Roberta is coming over, and she has a boy your age, Rhodey. Remember him? From Christmas last year?"

"He's coming over now?" Tony asked, something akin to panic reflecting in his eyes.

"They'll be here any minute."

Tony turned on his heel and took off running, and a minute later Howard heard his bedroom door slam. Sighing, the man trudged across the room and through the hall to stand outside his son's bedroom door. He twisted the knob and stepped inside, his eyes widening.

"Um, Tony…what are you doing?"

Tony was halfway under the bed when he heard his father ask him what he was doing.

"Uh… I think I lost my, uh, phone under here somewhere," he lied.

"Well, I think I heard squeaking coming from under there last night, so I hope you don't see any mice."

Tony gasped and jerked, his head hitting the wooden underside of the bed painfully with a thud. He heard his father laugh, and he growled.

"Not funny!"

"For me or for you?" Howard knelt down and grabbed the boy's ankle, dragging him from under the bed and standing until his head was a foot off the ground, his brown hair falling away from eyes as his face turned red.

"Dad…blood…rushing to my head…"

Howard chuckled and dropped Tony onto the bed, where he bounced and nearly hit the floor. They heard the doorbell ring, and the boy's blood dropped to subzero.

"That'll be them… C'mon, come say hello."

Tony nervously followed Howard into the living room, trying to imagine what Rhodey would think of him. From what he remembered of Christmas he had been fairly nice, but he may have been trying to be courteous…

"Hello, Roberta," Howard greeted as he opened the door to a tall, pretty woman with long brown hair and a nice blue suit.

"Hey, Roberta," Tony called, waving.

"Hi, Tony, hi, Howard," Roberta smiled warmly as she walked inside before stepping to the side to reveal a boy, maybe a few inches taller than Tony, in a grey jacket and jeans. "Tony, this is my son, Rhodey. Rhodey, this is Tony. Say hello to him."

"Hello," Rhodey said, not raising his eyes from the floor as he fidgeted with his jacket.

_He looks even more nervous than me,_ Tony thought. _Why?_

"Hi, Rhodey," Tony said, smiling. He bit his lip when he still saw how uncomfortable the boy looked, and he tried to think about what other kids would do in this situation. Then he threw that idea out when he remembered he wasn't like other kids. "Um…do you want to go to my room and…hang out?"

Rhodey looked up and blinked in surprise. "Really?"

"Yeah, totally. I mean, uh, if you want to."

"Okay!"

The two adults watched as their kids bounded after one another to Tony's room. After a few minutes, the sound of laughter could be heard, as well as the rapid, happy chatter of children.

"Well, I'd say they like each other," Roberta smiled.

A few hours later, after the Rhodes had left and Howard was pretending not to notice that Tony had snuck up to the lab after his bed time to work on some invention, he stopped in Tony's room to take out the trash. Right on the top of the boy's trash can, on top of many crumpled schematics and broken pens, was the proof that Tony had made a new friend.

Tony's robot was in the trash can, no longer needed.


End file.
